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Korea and Jeju - Day 6

20:24

Day 6:

Rise and shine at 6.30am again! For
the past few days, morning calls were ALWAYS at 6.30am.

We had breakfast at the exact same
restaurant where we had our dinner the night before. There were really only a
few chunks of abalone in the porridge and it was quite bland. Overall, it
wasn't a very satisfying breakfast.

Our last stop at Jeju Island would be
the Oeolgae Rock, one of the filming locations of
Daejanggeum, where the main character's teacher died.

aka the Forever Alone rock. haha.

Once again, the place was flooded
with tourists from mainland China and this old uncle kept photobombing. :(

Our entire tour group got so
exasperated of getting our queues cut and photobombed that we formed a
protective circle around the area for a while.

It's finally time for us to leave
Jeju for Seoul!

I'm going to miss the sea breeze and the sea view

We took Jinair back to Gimpo again.

I was so excited when I walked up the
plane! I think I spotted Korean stars! The entire first row had around 5-6 guys
in caps, shades and some of them were even in masks. The one guy closest to the
aisle had really great complexion and a damn straight nose. He only had shades
and a cap on, so from what I could see, he looked freaking hot. OMO OMO OMO!
Any idea which boy band or Korean stars were on JinAir, morning flight LJ0308
at around 10am, on 11 June 2014?

HAHA. I couldn't even sleep on the
flight back to Gimpo. I tried straining my neck to catch a glimpse of the guys
in front. The one closest to the aisle had a red cap and wore crimson high-top
sneakers. Sadly, they were the first to leave the plane. =( No more ogling.
Sighs.

We reached Gimpo, and then went for
buffet/shabushabu lunch at mor mor.

mormor offered international cuisine.
I spotted pizza, burritos, spaghetti, miso soup, udon, ddeokbokki, gyoza
dumplings, and loads other stuff. Each of us had our individual steamboats and
we could adjust the temperatures of our stoves. Best lunch ever!

We walked out into the streets of
Seoul and it was actually rather hot then.

Our post-lunch programme would
be kimchi-makingand trying out the hanbok (traditional
Korean costumes).

The principal of the kimchi school is
so strict! When she was explaining, she expected all of us to stop whatever we
were doing (no photos at all) and listen. Apparently her chopping skills were
so fine that in Daejanggeum, her hands were used for the kitchen scenes instead
of the main lead's hands. Hmm... I suppose being a hand model is an actual
profession.

Though she explained the details of
making kimchi, like soaking the veggies in salt water, making the paste using
chilli powder, yulu, onions and etc, the procedure seems so tedious that I
doubt anyone would try making kimchi on their own once we get back to
Singapore. Ready-to-eat kimchi can be bought easily from any supermarket, so
why would we go through the trouble of fermenting it?

After we made the kimchi, they were
wrapped and further processed before being sent to homes and orphanages. The
made-with-love kimchi! The staff at the school tried selling us huge bags of
kimchi veggies, kimchi octopus, kimchi squid and etc. They were priced at
10,000 won per pack and it was a buy-5-get-1-free promotion. However, I don't
think I'll want to eat kimchi every single day. It would spoil before I could
even finish it. This time, we didn't buy anything.

Next stop: SHOPPING!

My eyes practically lit up when
Jullie mentioned shopping at Dongdaemun. It's like the
shopping haven of Seoul. The main shopping streets in Seoul would be
Dongdaemun, Namdaemun, Sinchon, Myeongdong and Itaewon.

From my previous research over the
net, Migliore was the best place to shop at. The prices
are affordable (slightly cheaper than in Singapore, around Bugis/Chinatown
prices) and the clothes there are rather fashionable. We walked into doota!,
looked at the prices, and made a detour back again. Though doota's clothes are
all irresistibly trendy and hip, the prices are similar to what you'd get at a
typical shopping mall in Singapore (or even more expensive than that!). My main
objective in Seoul was to get cheap and nice loot, so doota would be out of the
question.

Based on tips from Jullie, it's best
if you speak English in the malls. DO NOT SPEAK CHINESE. Korean shopkeepers
absolutely detest tourists from Mainland China. Their attitude would be
terrible when they assume that you're from China. Also, keep an eye on your
bags. Pickpockets are rampant in such tourist-y areas.

To prepare us for some bargaining
(prices aren't fixed in such places), Jullie taught us a few phrases:

Er mal eh yo? (How much is it?)

Unni (sister) / I-mo (Auntie),
muji muji ippoyo (It's very pretty)

Sa-geh? (Lower the price?)

Well, I'm not sure if it worked out
for the shopkeepers were rather reluctant to lower the prices here (We had
better luck bargaining in Sinchon). They kept pointing at the "sale"
signs and said that it was the lowest price that they could offer.

It's crucial to note that for certain
shops, when they don't price the clothes, they can quote ridiculous amounts.
This guy shopkeeper gave us a 15,000 won discount for a simple T-shirt from the
first price that he quoted. Still, the shirt costed around SGD35 and I decided
it definitely wasn't worth it.

We were laden with shopping bags at
the end of the 2.5 hour shopping trip. Somehow, I spotted my batchmate,
Felicia, outside Migliore with her parents. What are the chances of seeing
someone from the same school overseas? Such a coincidence. I didn't say hi
though because I don't know her personally and I figured it'll be rather
awkward to just walk up to her. haha.

Hungry from the shopping, we headed
for dinner!

Each of us had a whole chicken to
ourselves, a 2-year ginseng (urgh. bitter.), glutinous rice stuffed in the
chicken, and some noodles in the hot pot. Before we eat, we had to pour in a
cup of ginseng wine. The meal wasn't too bad, though some may find it a little
to bland. Most of my tourmates added really generous amounts of salt and
pepper. I don't think anyone managed to finish the entire pot by
himself/herself. The soup is really nutritious so if you couldn't finish the
noodles, at least drink up the soup.

Paris baguette was everywhere in
Seoul. Prices of the pastries were also cheaper than in Singapore. Of course I
bought some for supper!

Cheonggyecheon

We walked past the artificial creek
in Seoul, and I wanted to pose for a picture in the middle of the stones. We
didn't have enough time though, for our show, Bibap, was
starting soon.

Bibap show!

The introduction in the brochure
seems exciting! It was said to be a "Delicious Musical". The show
even garnered rave reviews from The Scotsman and Edinburgh Spotlight.

The performance sure didn't
disappoint. Initially I was worried about the language barrier but it turned
out they spoke really minimal English (and no Korean at all!) The performers
beatboxed, did a cappella, b-boyed, did some acrobatics and martial arts. (Yes,
the b-boying guys had a damn good figure and hot abs.) They even had audience
interaction! It left me with cramps from all the laughing and if you ask me for
one word to sum it up, it'd be: AWESOME!

The hotel we stayed at for the last 2
nights would be Courtyard Marriott at Times Square (5 star hotel). It was right
beside a shopping mall and I was ready to do some late-night shopping. However,
Jullie reminded us that due to the large numbers of foreigners in the area,
it's like a red-light district at night if you end up on the wrong side of the
street. It's safer for females to not wander out at night.

The room was clean, cozy and nice
(but wifi was only available in the lobby). The service provided by the hotel
staff was great too. We were short of two towels and they promptly brought it
up right after our call. Thank goodness the staff here could all understand
English, unlike the staff at the other hotels.

The room's toilet had clear glass
windows so we had to pull down the blinds when using it. My paranoid siblings
were like, "Help me check no one's spying on me while I shower!" Ahhh
kids.

I completely zonked out once I hit
the pillow. Gotta rest well before another busy day!